Long-lived industrial installations, for example rolling mills, paper mills or glass manufacturing plants, are built for a specific purpose. At the same time the conditions prevailing in the sales, technology, method and factor markets relevant to the installation at the time of planning and erection are taken into account along with the associated risks, and also projected into the future.
In the course of the service life of an installation of said kind there are changes not only in these conditions but also with regard to the integration of the installation into a corporate context. Thus, for example, the products to be produced can be developed further as a result of customer requirements or technological development, and so also can the technology employed in the manufacture of said products. The existing technology is subject to wear and tear or to some other aging process. In the context of software or IT systems this is referred to as obsolescence. Due to these circumstances additional entrepreneurial risks arise over the course of the installation's life. These can manifest themselves for example in a decline in the quality of the products, in production downtimes, in competitors' gaining a lead, or also through missed business opportunities.
It is known that over the lifecycle of an installation there is carried out at specific time intervals routine maintenance, event-dependent active maintenance, or at longer time intervals a complete modernization of the installation. In some branches of industry, for example in the automobile industry, it has also proven to be economically feasible to discount the longevity of the installation and for example to build a new production facility in synchronism with each product innovation.
The disadvantage of routine maintenance and active maintenance is that with this, in the best case the original status, which is largely determined by the design, can be restored. An improvement or adaptation to new conditions, production factors, products, markets or corporate strategies does not take place.
Although complete modernization does not have this disadvantage, for its part it does have the disadvantage that a considerable production outage is always associated with it, and that a financially and technically complicated handling process with not inconsiderable additional risks has to be initiated.
Because of the high investment volume and the fiscal depreciation periods associated therewith, it is not possible to sacrifice longevity in the same way in all branches of industry.